Slot ownership
 

Slot ownsership is a fun thing. BMI "bought" BMed, and immediately sold the slots at LHR to BA.
So, the BA liveried "BMED" flights are actually protecting a BA asset.

GBALU53

No engineering has ever been made on the a/c positioned into Cardiff other than when it went tech, The reports in the news forgets to mention that for a month after Christmas,the a/c did not position to CWL because of either BMED moving offices or ATC which meant that no traffic were to take off unless it had to.

During the time of the Fog were most UK airport were effected it was sent out to do a rescue mission to collect bags that had been left behind.

BMED has slots that will be lost if they don't use them, which they wanted to keep. What else can they do (except to use a smaller a/c on lease), i'm not sure if it would cost them more to do so.

Lets see how successful BAs new LGW-NQY daily service is. B737-436 with a 2 hour turnaround in NQY... Keeping the slots open by 'ghost-flighting' or what... (Certainly not as canny as the LHR-CWL flights)

Dont get me wrong, I love Newquay. Great place and great people but come on, A daily B737-436 (146 seater) is just a little over the top... Leave it to the specialist airlines like AirSouthwest, who operate the right size aircraft and are a local company.

Another case of Bully-boy antics by Wishy Washy and the 'Dream Team' at Waterworld.

The airlines (or rather a select brotherhood of airlines) control slots at LHR and many other airports, through a company they own called ACL.

Much as BAA has lost the plot about most things, they are innocent in this case.

In the context of nursing slots, ask BMI the reasons for its new LHR/JER service starting March 25th. Good use of slot assets? Hardly. Keeping the slots warm until a better opportunity opens up, such as more crossings of the pond? Yup, but don't tell them in St Helier.

Just a couple of thoughts.

Firstly, wouldn't it be better if BMED was allowed to lease the slot to another airline for however long they are not using it? I'm sure there are plenty of airlines out there who would like to use it. Without BMED losing the slot in the interim.:confused: Surely that would be a logical solution, rather than forcing the airline into wasting loads of money operating a makeshift flying club!:ugh:

Secondly, in reply to tristar500, I also thought it was a bit strange that BA have started flying to NQY from LHR, especially with a 734. But having said that Ryanair fly there once a day with an -800 (189 seats), and that used to be twice a day until NQY put up their pax charges. So there must be a market, 'cos believe me FR wouldn't operate the flight for long if it wasn't making them money.

Whatever makes anyone think that BMI would have anything other than a fiasco on their hands with a LHR-JFK service, when United, well established as a transatlantic carrier at both ends, a fellow Star Alliance carrier and with a huge Frequent Flyer following, finally gave up exactly the same route this year after a long decline because they were just squeezed out by the others ?

BA loses ECJ appeal - and €6.8 million
 

http://curia.europa.eu/en/actu/commu...cp070023en.pdf

Is this airline jinxed or what?

They will need another season of protection at LHR to pay the fine.

Actually, they are allowed to do this. Airlines do "slot babysitting" deals like this with each other from time to time. The problem probably was that - since BMED is hoping to use the slot again reasonably soon - it's not very attractive to another airline - they would use it to start a service but then have to drop it within a matter of months when BMED took the slot back.

I think we have to remember that our industry is subject to some of the most hysterical outbursts going, and that if a pilot so much as coughs in the wrong manner, suspicions will be aroused.

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/tra...cle2359090.ece

Is another example of the latest barking mad journalism - whipped up entirely by Mr Brown (as in Jonathan, the author, not the greedy chancellor) no doubt.

This article is having a go at BA for operating more short haul routes from LCY. It even suggests that people should take the train (7 hours) to Frankfurt - come on!

But if the airlines themselves don't get together to talk some sense, they only have themselves to blame. I haven't seen any of them yet point out that targetting domestic flights for more taxes is not needed, as they already pay TWICE the rate of APD!

Just noticed this about BA Cityflyer in this weeks Flight Magazine World Airline Directory

"British Airways subsidiary that has been set up follwoing the sale of BA Connect to Flybe to operate scheduled services from London City Airport. The domestic services link London City with Birmingham, Bristol, East Midlands, Edinburgh, Glasgow & Manchester. While the international network serves 17 destinations in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Switzerland"

Interesting number of destinations seem to have appeared (or a journalistic c**k up!)

BA/IB Merger
 

http://www.uk-airport-news.info/heat...ews-260307.htm

I have read this article, and have afew questions that I would like to bring up:

1. At the moment, LH, AF/KLM, FR and AB are the four largest airlines on European flights (no. of slots). If BA were to merge with IB, would this put BA ahead of all 4 of these airlines? IB operate a HUGE number of domestic flights through Air Nostrum and on their mainline stream (operating the most frequent flights on a domestic route in the world - MAD-BCN), and BA has a HUGE presence at LHR and LGW, although it has sold it's domestic arm (BA Connect)?

2. Where would BA then fit into the league tables as the world largest airline on passenger numbers? They would be up there with the other big boys, such as LH and CO, maybe not AA and DL.

3. If they were to merge, would this mean the end of Clickair in anybody's opinions, or would BA see this as a great way in which to attack the LCCs, by allowing Clickair to maybe take over some of the shorter LHR routes, such as CDG, AMS and FRA, orffering the extremly cheap fares, but operate from the LHR. This would certainly not help FR and EZY at STN, LGW and LTN! Imagine that-being able to connect through LHR on a Loco flight!:D

Anyway, the deal may never happen, and if it were to, it is early days, but I would be very happy to hear about your opinions, and what you think will happen.

Cheers.

Flyboy ; think its a c**k up. Why would you want to fly from London to Birmingham, almost as quick to drive.

Exactly my thoughts which is why I posted the piece, likewise with Bristol & East Midlands.:rolleyes:

BA/BMI
 

it's stated in the papers today that BA may make a 1 billion bid for BMI for its slots at LHR making BA 53% of slots at LHR

BA CityFlyer
 

Further to towser's comment: by my count, BA's international destinations from LCY are Frankfurt, Zurich, Milan and Madrid. That's quite a way from 17 (even if you also count their two domestic destinations, GLA and EDI), and misses Austria, Belgium, and France from the list as well. Looks as though they mistakenly sent the April 1 joke world-domination press release to Flight International by mistake... ;)

Does anyone know which engines the new 777-200s will have? Given the majority of the fleet is GE does this have the advantage or did BA buy RR on the later ships due to being unhappy with the GE engine? Any operators out there know which is the better performing engine, SFC, Reliability etc. TIA. :}

BACityFlyer...
 

Perhaps Flight did a block copy of last year's BAConnect entry and forgot to amend it?!

BA tops lost luggage league table
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6524639.stm
Wednesday, 4 April 2007, 06:16 GMT 07:16 UK

British Airways lost more luggage than any other major European airline last year, figures have shown. For every 1,000 passengers carried by BA in 2006, 23 bags went missing according to data from the Association of European Airlines (AEA).

The UK's Air Transport Users Council (AUC) which released the figures said BA had admitted its performance was not good enough and had apologised. Across the 24 largest airlines, more than 5.6 million bags went missing. This is an average of 15.7 bags per 1,000 travellers.

About 85% of missing bags were returned to their owners within 48 hours, the AEA said, but it added that some "never get returned at all".
[article continues]

In fairness isn't it down to the airport belt system and the handling agents for lost luggage rather than the airline itself.

The Airline only carries the luggage from A 2 B if it's on-board and fills in the Property Irregularity Report at the Destination.

Could be many reason's it was left behind beyond the controll of the airline.

• Passenger Sent back from Security as hand luggage is (too big, has liquids or other restricted items) and dispatcher has accepted the bag providing it reaches the a/c in time.
• Bag had fallen off the baggage trolley en-route to the a/c.
• Bag has been trapped on the baggage belt or possibly fallen off at the back.
• Bag picked up by another passenger by mistake.
• Tag fallen of bag at Departure airport.

The only reason i can see if it is the airlines fault is if the bag has had to be removed from the a/c due to a/c weight restrictions or a/c overweight.

cheers :ok:

Why don't BA operate Business class only flights across the Atlantic? LH,KLM and LX all fly from their bases in thier own territory to either EWR or IAH. Why aren't BA following suit? This is also the case of AF, who operate A319s to the Middle East.

Is it because BA are able to fill up a plane in all three classes to wherever they fly to from LHR?;)

MUFC_fan. In reply to your comments, Why would anyone want to buy Iberia? It is facing rapidly intensifying domestic competition from Veuling and others. It has had to create Clickair with other partners because it cannot make money in BCN. It has what is rumoured to be a fractious relationship with Air Nostrum which it does not own and yields in all markets in Spain are under threat as LOCOs expand. A good example of this is that EasyJet now massively outcarries Iberia at AGP. In order to be attractive to anyone IB has to address its costs. At the moment it looks a bit like Aer Lingus and some other European legacy carriers. A financial expert would probably say sell your shares.

Are you being serious?!

BA and TGP are in serious discussions with their advisors about a possible 3 billion pound take-over, why would you sell your shares now?!

A decent stock broker would be buying shares, and reaping the rewards from the speculation across the world's newspapers!

Why would AGP bother IB? EZY mainly serve the UK plus Milan, Geneva, Berlin, Dortmund and Basel, not the domestic routes from AGP. If there is somewhere that IB need to be looking at it is MAD! EZY AND FR have already based aircraft this year, and EZY have started the domestic routes.

I do agree about the fares though. I think BA have found the perfect medium. Still offer the free meal etc onboard, but have fares starting from 29 GBP. I suppose it also helps BA with no LoCo (except Clickair) at LHR.

What percentage of slots do British Airways have at Gatwick, and what is the extent of the assets they have there?

Cannot respond on the slot number though it is in excess of 30% and BA operate 155 flights per day. I doubt that with 'open sky' BA could afford to pull out and I have to agree with a previous comment, that it is fraught with problems the purchase of IB. I well remember the shambles of the TAT purchase and IB staff T & Cs are archaic and will take years to change.

British Airways - Tricky question?
 

What are the main external challenges facing BA in the next two years?

Climate change
Terrorism
Competition probe into slots
Unions
Stock market investor sentiment

Terminal 5.

Open Skies, specifically the scope for much-increased transatlantic competition out of LHR.

Lack of customers due to the state they are in.

BA are trying to cut costs by reducing staff and are using the move to T5 to try (as a by product of the move) to do that, the staff know that and are therefore concerned about their jobs and are of course unhappy, which even unintentionally filters down to the customers - I personally do not find BA very customer friendly now and although I liked to fly BA in the past now they come across to me as just the same as any other airline - I have flown United the last three times I have flown across the Atlantic.

Alex Ford

Themselves......

Is it just me or does the questioner work at Waterworld and need it answered or he gets fired? lol
Helluva broad topic to ask as a first question. They'll cope. The number of good productive people outnumbers the media types and half wits.
Just.........
Getting rid of the lazy militant pampered ground staff who think they're better than they are.
Outsourcing everything but the pilots, cabin crew and engineers because let's face it, the rest is what handling agents are for.
A summer without a strike.
Getting shot of anyone who thinks it's still 1979 and the state airline owes them a living.
Focusing on a single terminal operation that works smoothly.
Realising that done properly ( see above ) BA Gatwick can compliment Heathrow.
Deciding to replace all those B737s with shiny new A319 / A320s
Getting BA Cityflyer to make money
:)
Realising that with a third runway it may be worth looking again at maintaining UK regional services and possibly re-linking ( again ) to Jersey, Inverness, Belfast etc.
Who said bmi????

Its an application qu for Flight Deck.....

Gordon Brown-Organ, should he become the next PM.

Sorry if this has been posted already somewhere else but, you can now buy tickets for BA's first Terminal 5 flights on 27th March 08. The first departure is to CDG and the first inbound a/c is from Hong Kong.

Ryanair and other loco's.:ok:

Well, I'm no longer a big BA fan, but given the choice between FR or BA I'd go BA any day. The FR product is vastly inferior.

Avman
 

Well with Ryanair pax numbers more than BA's, The pax are
coming from somewhere.

One of the worst things BA have ever done was to sell GO Airlines.

You stay with BA leave's more of the £0.99 offers for me:D .

I wouldn't say Ryanair are the main Loco threat to BA as they operate into mainly different airports.

easyJet on the other hand. . . .

Ryanairs route map is changing, there are more and more
Airports poping up that the so called flag carriers fly.

Madrid, Palma, Alicante, Bari, Pisa, Turin, Salzburg, Montpellier,
Grenoble, Malta, and dont forget Rome (CIA) closer to
Rome city Centre than (FCO).

Looking at BA's European route map against Ryanairs, its clear
which airline gives more choice throughout Europe.

Donttellthepax
 

If you and others are happy with FR that's fine by me. I fly on locos too, but those I fly on still (in my opinion of course) offer a vastly superior overall product than FR do. But I think we're going off thread now ;)